


Baby Love (My Baby Love)

by compo67



Series: Punzel Verse [7]
Category: Supernatural RPF
Genre: Comfort, Drag Queens, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Families of Choice, Family, Friendship/Love, Grief/Mourning, HIV/AIDS, Loss, M/M, Minor Character Death, Misha POV, Reminiscing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-29
Updated: 2014-09-29
Packaged: 2018-02-19 05:49:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,405
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2377061
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/compo67/pseuds/compo67
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>On a night Misha can't sleep, he takes to the couch and his memories keep him company until someone else does.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Baby Love (My Baby Love)

**Author's Note:**

> Baby Love by The Supremes while you read.

The house on Magnolia Street didn't look like much when they bought it. 

Previous owners hadn't put much time into maintaining or updating anything about the property--nasty divorce, the real estate agent had mentioned. So, when Misha stepped in and looked around, he didn't feel much of anything. There was no aha moment. Actually, he liked the house they'd just seen four blocks over, near Broadway. That one had a pool.

"Who needs a pool," Jeff had asked him after the first showing, "when the beach is minutes away?"

Quite a few things had to be torn up and out when they signed the deed. Sometimes it was fun pretending to be contractors and construction workers and handymen. There were a few afternoons where Misha would joke about being straight and how macho they were with so many surges of testosterone fueling them as they ripped out cabinets. And then there were afternoons where they'd get so frustrated over the work, their lack of knowledge, and what they just got themselves into. 

Some nights ended up with them covered in paint and debris, eating cold, greasy pizza and lying next to each other near the broken fireplace.

Jeff had the opposite reaction to the house when they first saw it. He was ready to sign. He saw past everything the house had ever been to anyone else and saw it as what I was to him--to them.

So Jeff got the first big decision for them as a couple. His passion for the place--the bay windows, the large backyard, the many guest rooms which meant more space for little ones--won Misha over, not the house itself. 

The first round of construction they did themselves with some DIY books and elbow grease to save on cost. When the bathrooms and plumbing and electrical things got involved, Jeff knew they had to bring in help. 

Back then, Lulu was their woman. Born as Michael Robin Key, he grew into Lulu, a contractor by day and gorgeous drag queen by night. Lulu was six foot eight in heels and twice as loud as the outfits she wore. She called Jeff out when he phoned it in on stage and she assembled a team of Californian queers for their first housewarming party under the stars in their backyard. 

No one could light a charcoal grill, serve enough burgers to feed a small homosexual army, and make martinis like Lulu. She took their house as a challenge. 

Tonight, just another Tuesday night, Misha woke up with pain in a familiar place. It happens. Nerves and things, his organs rearranging to fill the space left by surgical instruments and surgeon's gloves. He tossed and turned and drew himself up small and tight. He rolled out of bed without waking Jeff up. The man did a double shift with the babies so Jensen could stay overnight in Anaheim to help one of Hannah's sons. Everyone on Magnolia is tired.

Misha lies on a couch in the living room that smells like baby powder and vanilla. This is Jared's favorite couch. It used to be Lulu's. 

The lights are kept off, but Misha plugs in his heat pad, a trusted friend throughout time. He places it over his lower stomach and curls up with the fleece blanket Linda gave them a month ago. It has already been drooled and chewed on--by any adults who crash on it, exhausted from the care and tending of three babies. 

Lulu would have a fit to know that Misha and Jeff are parents to three tiny humans. Misha smiles to himself despite his discomfort. 

Every Queen should have a signature color. That was one of Lulu's commandments. Jeff's is pearl white. Hers was bashful pink. 

"Don't you mean blush and bashful?" Misha asked her because he didn't know any better. 

"Honey, this isn't a fucking Magnolia moment. Do I look like god damn Julia Roberts? Don't answer that." 

Santa Monica is home to a close knit community of queens. They look out for each other. These are queens who used to work in cities like San Francisco and LA who grew tired of the scene and the scene grew tired of them. Elegance is blasé. Tact and The Supremes have no place on stage in The Castro. 

They thought of her when the boys agreed to move in. 

How she might have done the rooms, the nursery, the backyard. Misha closes his eyes. 

How she might have held Kaylee.

At seven months old, Kaylee has learned that the men around her will give her anything she wants if she either smiles or cries. Jeff is a hopeless case. He'll be the one who lets her have a car when she's sixteen and encourages her to let the drama around her in high school roll off of her because she's above that shit. What lies ahead of them after diapers and peek a boo is the true test.

"I wanted children."

"You can still have kids, Lu."

"Nope."

"Yes you..."

"Mimi."

"What?"

"I can't."

"What?"

"I'm telling you first."

"Telling me what? What is it?"

How do you find love? How does it find you? Houses that need work. Manila folder pictures. Sugar cookies and photo albums and a stranger who looks like he'd kill the person that caused a frown. 

Post-its on the fridge. 

Ain't no mountain high enough. 

Baby Love on a rainy day in her best wigs.

No one dies of AIDS. They die of AIDS related complications. "Just like Liberace," she had said on the final day, "but maybe, I'm not as big of a douchebag. Honey, he was terrible."

Jeff held her hand. She was far from alone that day. The hospital had never seen so many queens packed into one room. The wide eyed looks from the nurses had made her smile.

She built half this house. So did five other queens, two of whom are also singing Streisand in the sky. 

Life, Misha has learned, gives. But it takes just as much.

It's broken his heart and left him sad.

How does he raise a family with memories of those that should be here? It's not fair. And it's not fair that he hurts in two different ways and he's on this couch and he should've woken Jeff up. It's not fair that what he has was some of the best and he'll never have her again.

Baby love.

It's not fair that their house should be this quiet.

Why must we separate, my love?

"Misha?"

That's not a voice inside his head.

"Huh?"

In his wrinkled pajamas, Jared stands three feet away from the couch. Mr. Bun is in one arm and a blanket is in the other. A glimmer of light from the street reveals a pinch of pain on Jared's face. Things are settling. Nerves. Organs. Muscle.

"I can't sleep."

She did that once. Just once. She called at four in the morning and he ran over to her apartment on the boulevard. It was so different than their usual meetings; cocktails weren't alcoholic and a shadow wasn't a thing on the wall, it was a person. 

Misha's arm moves without thought or hesitation. 

He opens the blanket up. 

Between them, they share the heat pad. Jared is four inches taller standing up, but he fits into Misha's chest just fine. This is easy. Easier than Misha thought it might be.

He doesn't want to be a parent to either of the boys. That's not what they need. And he doesn't want to think he knows everything because he's older. It is his sincerest hope that they become more than parents together. 

It hurt to get here.

It hurts to be here.

A kiss is pressed to Misha's cheek. The kiss mingles with a tear he didn't know he was shedding.

His hair is smoothed out and there is no question about the next tear or the tear after that or the one after that. There is no demand for an explanation or request to get it together. 

No one should be loved for who you want them to be. People should be loved for who they are.

She'd get a kick out of them on the couch right now.

"You're finally learning how to let someone else take care of your sorry ass."

Misha cries out a muffled laugh.

Lulu.

No swearing.

**Author's Note:**

> Oh goooood. D8
> 
> /head desk/
> 
> I need tissues, how about you?


End file.
